A Social Robot for Rehabilitation: Expert Clinicians and Post-Stroke Patients’ Evaluation Following a Long-Term Intervention

We developed a novel gamified system for post-stroke long-term rehabilitation, using the humanoid robot Pepper (Soft Bank, Aldebaran). Here, we present a participatory-design study with insights from both expert clinicians and from stroke patients who underwent a long-term intervention with the robot. We first present the results of a qualitative study with expert clinicians $(\mathrm{n}=12)$ on the compatibility of this system with the needs of post-stroke patients, and then the preliminary results of a long-term intervention study with post-stroke participants $(\mathrm{n}=4)$ in a rehabilitation facility. Both the clinicians and the patients found the robot and the gamified system engaging, motivating and meeting the needs of upper limb rehabilitation. The clinicians gave specific recommendations that may be applicable to a wide range of technologies for post-stroke rehabilitation. ACM Reference format: Ronit Feingold Polak and Shelly Levy-Tzedek. 2020. A Social Robot for Rehabilitation: Expert Clinicians and Post-Stroke Patients’ Evaluation Following a Long-Term Intervention. In Proceedings of HRI ’20: 2020 ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction, March 24–26, 2020, Cambridge, UK. ACM, NewYork, NY, USA, 10 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3319502.3374797